Dean Evans, CMO for Hyundai Motor America, has been planning the launch of its new Kona small SUV for almost a year. To improve the odds of a successful launch, he wanted to learn more about the target audience - active millennials - than the basics his previous research methods were providing. So he turned to a beta version of an AI-enabled social intelligence tool provided by Influential.

According to Evans, “We partnered with Influential around two pillars. The first was leveraging the power of AI to help define audiences better, using the world of social media and social content to help power that. The second was to find real influencers in the marketplace to help us get the word out through more organic and rich content.”

Through this process, he and his team learned that active millennials weren’t exactly the stereotypical surfers as they are often portrayed in other advertising. “What we found when we dug deeper was urban dwellers who like to do everyday activities, whether it’s going to a flea market today or an art sale the next day, versus going camping in the Rocky Mountain,” said Evans. “The Kona launch advertising and how we speak to this audience will be a little different than we thought going in.”

Courtesy Influential

Ryan Detert, Influential CEO

According to Influential CEO Ryan Detert, the AI-based tool that Hyundai used will now be available to all marketers. “Our core business has always been based off the idea of matching the brand’s psychographics with how they speak to and are perceived by their audience. We do this through Big 5 theory, much like Myers-Briggs, which is that a brand’s personality is made up of 47 attributes. We use an IBM Watson API called Personality Insights and we’re able to take the information we’re gleaning about what is being shared about a brand on social media and provide insight on brand health and the psychographics of their audience.”

With the launch of the Influential Social Intelligence service, Detert believes marketers can be smarter at engaging their core audiences across all media, not just social. “We also use another Watson API, Natural Language Understanding, to analyze all that is being said about a brand and who follows a brand to help determine the best way to go to market with a new product. Where do I put sponsorship dollars? Does my audience like the NFL or the NBA better? Do they like certain celebrities better for allocating my endorsement money? Do I spend money with Conde Nast or Hearst because of their affinity for GQ or its rival? It’s the predictive and prescriptive nature that we take to identify things marketers should use to improve their TV, radio, sponsorships, events and digital programs.”